Harry Potter star Johnny Flynn shares thoughts on Lucius Malfoy and Berlinale western

Johnny Flynn’s big year

Johnny Flynn is a British actor and musician who has been described as ‘on a showbiz roll’ and seemingly everywhere.

This week, he is in Berlin for the premiere of Dara Van Dusen’s A Prayer for the Dying, starring John C. Reilly, and expects to feel emotional because making the film was “such a powerful experience.”

Viewers may know him from the sitcom Lovesick or Autumn de Wilde’s 2020 film Emma, where he played George Knightley.

He also appears as Dickie Greenleaf in the 2024 series Ripley, turned up in Vanity Fair and Goodbye June, and leads Johnny Flynn & the Sussex Wit, a band that has released six studio albums.

From TV comedy to dark drama

Flynn’s screen work ranges from the British sitcom Lovesick to Kate Winslet’s directorial debut Goodbye June, released on Netflix in December.

He moved between period pieces like the 2018 miniseries Vanity Fair and Autumn de Wilde’s Emma before landing more recent roles in projects such as Ripley.

Alongside his acting career, Flynn is the lead singer-songwriter of Johnny Flynn & the Sussex Wit, who have released six studio albums. That mix of music and varied screen roles sets the stage for his latest leap into Dara Van Dusen’s haunting drama A Prayer for the Dying.

Landing A Prayer for the Dying

Flynn explains that A Prayer for the Dying came to him after long talks with director Dara Van Dusen about the project. He says another actor, his friend Callum Turner, had originally been set to play the lead, something he believes is already visible on IMDb.

Turner could not do the role, so Van Dusen called Flynn, feeling he would connect with a Norwegian-American character in 1870. Flynn notes that they shot the film about a year and a half ago and says the story, which defies genre, “ticks every box” for him.

A Civil War hero in Wisconsin

A Prayer for the Dying is set in 1870 in the Wisconsin town of Friendship and centers on Jacob Hansen, played by Flynn. Jacob is a hero of the American Civil War with Scandinavian heritage who cannot shake the violence he experienced as a soldier.

Trying to atone for his dark past, Jacob serves as the town’s sheriff, undertaker, and pastor while living with his wife, Marta, and their young child.

When an epidemic that the town doctor, played by John C. Reilly, cannot contain threatens to destroy everything they have built, Jacob must protect the residents by any means necessary.

Genre bending story of faith

Flynn resists calling A Prayer for the Dying a Western, agreeing that it is not a straight horror or historical drama and instead bends several genres. He sees it as a psychological portrait of someone trying to hold everything together while the world around him falls apart.

The film is adapted from Stewart O’Nan’s novella, which uses an unreliable narrator and a strange tense, so readers slowly realize that what Jacob says does not match others’ experiences.

Flynn describes the book and film as eerie, dreamlike, and rooted in the trauma of a Civil War past that the audience never fully sees.

Fun Fact: J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter share the same birthday, July 31.

From the Book of Job to the screen

Flynn says Dara Van Dusen told him that Stewart O’Nan’s novel was originally based on the Book of Job, where God allows a faithful man to lose everything. He explains that in that story, Job’s family and farm are destroyed after a challenge between God and the devil, yet Job still loves God.

Flynn says he finds this theological setup really interesting and describes it as an exciting starting point for the film’s story of loss.

He recalls that the historical record includes towns wiped out by illnesses without vaccines in the 19th century and links that to the “unimaginable amount of darkness” evoked in Wisconsin Death Trip.

Dara Van Dusen’s bold vision

Flynn remembers that director Dara Van Dusen discovered the book while in film school and spent years working closely with Stewart O’Nan to adapt it.

He says O’Nan had a bad experience with another adaptation, but Van Dusen’s passion as a student filmmaker won his trust and helped maintain the tone’s fidelity and uncanny quality.

On set, Flynn says Dara was kind and also uncompromising, fighting many battles to have the film made exactly as she saw it in her mind’s eye. He calls the project a “cool experiment” filled with frenetic, unorthodox energy and says it felt exciting to work on something that seemed truly unusual.

The camera as another character

Flynn explains that Dara Van Dusen worked very closely with cinematographer Kate McCullough, who is a close friend and key creative partner.

He recalls that the camera movements were unusual, with fast, jerky pans that only moved along certain angles, so the camera almost became another character in each scene.

Sometimes the camera places viewers inside Jacob’s head, creating a paranoid sense of what he sees as his mind unravels. Flynn says the way the camera moved in the corner of his eye made the point of view feel vivid and credits Dara’s strict approach for that distinctive look.

Watching John C. Reilly go dark

Before this film, Flynn mostly knew John C. Reilly for very funny comedic roles, and says he would watch him in anything. He describes it as uncanny and eerie to see Reilly in A Prayer for the Dying because audiences are used to him as a very fun presence.

Flynn believes Reilly is an amazing and possibly underrated dramatic actor, noting that his comedy works because he plays goofy material with total conviction. He calls Reilly a man of “extreme conviction,” a really interesting person, and says he enjoyed hanging out with him and working on the film.

Why the film feels so emotional

Flynn says he usually finds making any film powerful and emotional because he falls in love with the people around him, and they become like a family. He explains that as a project ends, it is moving to realize that the group will never again be together in the same way, telling the same story.

He has already watched A Prayer for the Dying on his laptop but is excited to see it with other people at the Berlin festival. He remembers attending the Berlinale once before, around 2005, for his first film, and recalls thick snow in the city, and says he hopes for snow again.

Chasing variety with MobLand and The Idiots

Flynn says he seeks variety in his career and wants to work on as many different types of projects as possible with visionary directors, actors, crew, and DPs.

He explains that the thrilling part of the job is that nothing is the same and that he enjoys testing himself with new roles and feeling something different inside.

He is currently working on a TV show called MobLand, where he plays a psychopath, which he describes as one of the more different jobs he has done.

He also recalls shooting The Idiots in the summer with directors Małgorzata Szumowska and Michał Englert and Aimee Lou Wood, calling it one of the best times he has had on a project.

Stepping into Lucius Malfoy’s robes

Flynn will soon play Lucius Malfoy in HBO’s new Harry Potter series and works closely with 14-year-old Lox Pratt, who plays his son Draco. He says Pratt is “a really, really cool guy” who is grounded, talented, and has a lot going on, and he is pleased that Pratt described him as having “aura.”

Flynn says he even asked his kids what that word meant and jokes that he is happy to be considered aura too.

He hopes that these young actors will have better treatment than previous generations and notes that while Lucius is hardly in the first book, he will still appear in the first season, dropping in for days of work between longer breaks.

Want all the details? Celebrate the magic a little longer with our full 25th anniversary into the wizarding world.

Rowling comments and online backlash

While promoting the new Harry Potter series, Flynn said there is “quite a lot of stuff around Jo Rowling” and that navigating those conversations has been interesting but important.

He then turned to the people on set, saying the team, including showrunner Francesca Gardiner and director Mark Mylod, created a really special atmosphere with great care and a welcoming environment.

After the interview was published, some social media users responded critically to Flynn’s comments about J.K. Rowling’s gender-critical views, highlighting concerns related to her public statements and donations.

For more on this magical handoff, explore our deep dive into Radcliffe’s letter and the next chapter of the Wizarding World on HBO.

Where do you stand on Johnny Flynn’s response and the Rowling debate? Share your take in the comments, and hit like if you want to see more conversations like this.

This slideshow was made with AI assistance and human editing.

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